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Growing in Coco 10 years. Lost my way
- Thread starter siftedunity
- Start date
shit i grew in coco once and lost the way went back quick to what i know/works
Midwest Toker
Member
I take it you are growing under LED's then?
No. what gave you that impression?
Midwest Toker
Member
I've never really experienced a mag problem under HID's.
ok I should have replied to this before but I changed a few things up and the problem was solved.
for me I switched to RO water.
I added 5 ml per gallon of cal mag..
I started topping up the res with some tap water. about 10-20%
and I STOPPED using drippers and went back to hand feeding.
the last one I think being critical for me. ive spent years in coco hand watering.. id basically wait until the circumference of the pot of coco started to ''tan'' and get dry, the medium as a whole would be moist, but drying. ive not got a clue what % moisture content that is.
then I switched to drippers and kept the coco ''wet'' so they didn't even dry out. seems like that when my problems started.. calcium deficiencies and nitrogen toxicity symptoms.
but the roots would look great but yield dropped off, plants looked stunted and didn't stack. that's when I posted this thread.
since hand watering again, and allowing the pots to dry out slightly, (not dry but id say 30% as heavy as freshly watered. the problem disappeared. no deficiencies, plants started stacking, yields went back up. so yeah. I know that people rock the whole ''keep it wet'' but it doesn't work for me and how I do things.
might be because I repot at flower and the pots are not root bound. I do have some mothers in veg and I flood them daily. they are over rooted in the pots and its hard/ impossible to overwater them. I thinks that's because the pot volume is small, that the water evaporates + the roots suck up a lot of water. so they don't even get a chance to get overwatered.
so I guess if I played with the same in flower, got a fairly big plant in a smallish pot then I'm sure I could drench them and they would keep growing and sucking it all up.
but it seems like keeping them wet and not allowing them to dry out some interferes with the calcium and nitrogen uptake. that's my guess.
ive now switched to using co2 and a sealed room. now I'm re learning how my plants are going to react to the environment which ive created for them. because higher light intensity and co2 plus higher temps throws a whole new set of potential issues that I need to try and understand. so ive not made things easy on myself.
for me I switched to RO water.
I added 5 ml per gallon of cal mag..
I started topping up the res with some tap water. about 10-20%
and I STOPPED using drippers and went back to hand feeding.
the last one I think being critical for me. ive spent years in coco hand watering.. id basically wait until the circumference of the pot of coco started to ''tan'' and get dry, the medium as a whole would be moist, but drying. ive not got a clue what % moisture content that is.
then I switched to drippers and kept the coco ''wet'' so they didn't even dry out. seems like that when my problems started.. calcium deficiencies and nitrogen toxicity symptoms.
but the roots would look great but yield dropped off, plants looked stunted and didn't stack. that's when I posted this thread.
since hand watering again, and allowing the pots to dry out slightly, (not dry but id say 30% as heavy as freshly watered. the problem disappeared. no deficiencies, plants started stacking, yields went back up. so yeah. I know that people rock the whole ''keep it wet'' but it doesn't work for me and how I do things.
might be because I repot at flower and the pots are not root bound. I do have some mothers in veg and I flood them daily. they are over rooted in the pots and its hard/ impossible to overwater them. I thinks that's because the pot volume is small, that the water evaporates + the roots suck up a lot of water. so they don't even get a chance to get overwatered.
so I guess if I played with the same in flower, got a fairly big plant in a smallish pot then I'm sure I could drench them and they would keep growing and sucking it all up.
but it seems like keeping them wet and not allowing them to dry out some interferes with the calcium and nitrogen uptake. that's my guess.
ive now switched to using co2 and a sealed room. now I'm re learning how my plants are going to react to the environment which ive created for them. because higher light intensity and co2 plus higher temps throws a whole new set of potential issues that I need to try and understand. so ive not made things easy on myself.
Midwest Toker
Member
Yeah same here. Your plants look happy man. If you pull the quality and yield then it's working. There's no way I could use 1ml per gal. Im using 5ml per gallon and could prob use more for heavy feeders..
i carefully read your first post. you provide very detailed info.
so you may need to calibrate your ph or/and ec meter again,
you do this every other month?
if not youre giving too much nutrients, so they build up in the coco (salts) thats why you get lower ph in drain and higher (very high) EC!
or not flushing every other week its needed for coco.
when your plants grow correctly the drain is just 0.1-0.2ec LOWER and the ph will RISE because of nutrient (salt) uptake. less salts = less acid = higher PH
because i got tap water ec 0.2 here
when i add plagron/canna etc... coco nutes
you give A and B 1,6 / 2ml
this is for 10 litres 16/20ml A/B
i didnt even go over 15/15
shedule says 35/35 or 40/40 LOL
this is all too much.
10/10 is even fine with plants over 5 feet! in 11L coco.
no need for EC higher than 1.2
when you dont flush the coco there will be buildups which will fuck up your grow.
i just did a few coco grows, before soil, and outdoor, and this is now my best in 10 years! (also started from seed again)
i always hand water them and give them plenty of nutrients drain in bathroom and put again inside. check drain, be good
worked great really amazing, so in my humble opinion they put a lot inside the coco nutes and its important (flush) because the plant just takes what she needs so the ratio is not correctly balanced anymore between NPK-micro. if you keep them just wet without drain.
PS: you can let the coco dry out fully like with soil and then make a flush and you will be suprised how much they like it in the next day they just KEEP A BIG SMILE FOR YOU!
try this you will be very happy
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Midwest Toker
Member
I use base hydro nutrients with the base containing 6% calcium nitrate already. So I don't overdue the nitrates in the mix, I only use the 1 ml per gallon.
no actually I run vpd in relation to temps, so its not dry at all. or low lit. 24000w of lighting, 5 plants per 600w.
thanks for your opinion, I calibrate my blue lab probe every couple of weeks and its always spot on,
I feed at 2ml per liter, if I fed any less id kill off my plants. ive noticed its actually keeping them wet that fucks them up.. if I keep them at the sweet spot they seem happy..
ok I get ya.. my nute mix is light on calcium from what I remember.
but really high on Nitrogen. which sucks because pretty much every calmag supplement has added nitrogen . so their N is already high. plus whatever the issue is exacerbates the whole N issue.
herbertbrown
New member
Hey siftedunity i have the same problems like you had with n toxicity and i have also calmag deficiencys. Runoff ph is low like 5.3 and ec is at 1.6-2.0. I feed at 1.2 ec..
Can i ask you some questions?
What calmag do you use?
What nutrient strength do you give your seedlings/cuttings?
I started my seedlings in rapid rooter and transplanted into canna coco and gave 1ml/l sensi coco, that was around 0.6 and i didnt use any calmag. Im not sure if it was too much from the beginning so i will try my next plants with the right ec but i dont know if i should mix calmag from the beginning and how much of it.
I tried to feed the plants with 1.5ec sensi coco but the plants really start to get dark because of the N in it
if i feed the plants lower like 1.0-1.2 ec sensi bloom i have calmag deficiencys.
